Apparatus and method for capturing a document

ABSTRACT

An apparatus for capturing a document with a plurality of compression models comprises an image-processing system and an image-capturing system. The image-processing system is for accepting a request of setting the compression models for the document and processing the data of the document according to the compression models, wherein the request is from an exterior electric device connected to the apparatus. The image-capturing system is for capturing the data of the document, and is connected to the image-processing system and comprises multitudes of optic devices. The method for capturing the document with these compression models comprises accepting a request of setting the compression models for the document; capturing the data of the document; and processing the data of the document with these compression models.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The invention relates to an image-capturing apparatus and method, andmore particularly relates to an image-capturing system and method withcompression technologies.

2. Description of the Prior Art

Most computer systems use a form of raster image to output image data toa visual output device such as a cathode ray tube (CRT) monitor, liquidcrystal display (LCD), or a printer such as a color laser copier. Araster image is represented as a series of scan lines of pixels, whereineach pixel is accessed in a sequential manner, and each scan line isprocessed. An area to which image data may be output sequentially by thevisual output device is referred to as a page. The image data of a pageprovides its complete visual representation.

Interpreters of page description languages typically process images inone or both of two modes: band mode and frame mode. Both of thesehowever generally require a buffer memory which can hold the entirevisual representation of a page, it is desirable to reduce the buffermemory requirements, for example by using some form of compression. Ingeneral apparatus of image-capture, such as a scanner, there are twomodels in a technology of compression. “Loss-less” is one that imagedata captured by the scanner is decompressed without distortion, while“Lossy” is one that the image data is distorted after decompression. Onecompression method is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,269,190 to Mikkelsen etal. related to processes and apparatus for processing image data. A pageof an image is divided into several regions. Each of these regions maybe compressed according to a different technique according to the kindof data within the region. Each region can be compressed with a methodthat works well for the data contained in that region.

Another compression method is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,097,845 to Ng etal. It is for discriminating among image characteristics in order toselect among a plurality of compression techniques. Multiple compressionschemes are applied to a source image concurrently and the results arestored. Image discrimination is performed in parallel with the imagecompression to generate a recommendation regarding the stored compressedimages.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is a principal object of the present invention to provide a systemand method of image capture. Users can determine a captured imagecoordinated with settings of various compression models. Thus, thecapture rate speeds up as well as the captured image isn't distorted.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a method ofscanning applied on a scanner. A scanned object can be divided intovarious zones with various compression ratios set by users.

In the present invention, an apparatus for capturing a document with aplurality of compression models comprises an image-processing system andan image-capturing system. The image-processing system is for acceptinga request of setting the compression models for the document andprocessing the data of the document according to the compression models,wherein the request is from an exterior electric device connected to theapparatus. The image-capturing system is for capturing the data of thedocument, and is connected to the image-processing system and comprisesmultitudes of optic devices. The method for capturing the document withthese compression models comprises accepting a request of setting thecompression models for the document; capturing the data of the document;and processing the data of the document with these compression models.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

A better understanding of the invention may be derived by reading thefollowing detailed description with reference to the accompanyingdrawings wherein:

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an image-capturing system 11 for practicingthe present invention; and

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating the flow chart in accordancewith the present invention.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

While the invention is described in terms of a single preferredembodiment, those skilled in the art will recognize that many devicesdescribed below can be altered as well as other substitutions with samefunction and can be freely made without departing from the spirit andscope of the invention.

Furthermore, the drawings are not necessarily to scale for clarify ofillustration and should not be interpreted in a limiting sense.Furthermore, the present invention can be applied on otherimage-capturing apparatus without limitation of a scanner in the presentinvention.

In the present invention, a capturing system for capturing a documentwith a plurality of compression models comprises computer-readableprograms, an processing system, and a scanning system. Thecomputer-readable programs are stored in a computer connected to saidcapturing system and used for providing a display interface forassigning the compression models to the zones on the document. Theprocessing system is for accepting a request of setting the compressionmodels for the document and processing the data of the documentaccording to the compression models. The request is from thecomputer-readable programs. The scanning system is connected to theprocessing system and used for capturing the data of the document andtransferring the data to the processing system. The method for capturingthe document with these compression models comprises accepting a requestof setting the compression models for the document; capturing the dataof the document; and processing the data of the document with thesecompression models.

Referring now to FIG. 1, there is shown a block diagram of animage-capturing system for practicing the present invention. Theimage-capturing system 11 may be implemented as functional componentswithin a scanning system, and may take the form of hardware or software,or some combination thereof. In one embodiment, the components of FIG. 1may be implemented in any hardware platform suitable for a scanningsystem. For example, there are a data capture part 12 and a data processpart 14 in the image-capturing system 11. The data capture part 12, suchas optical devices and the related peripheral apparatus or circuits, isresponsible to capture the raw data of a document 10 when the document10 is scanned by the image-capturing system 11. The document 10 istypically a paper document containing a source image of some kind. Thesource image may be primarily grayscale, such as a photograph, orprimarily bitonal, such as text. Alternatively, the source image is amore complex image type incorporating both grayscale and bitonalcomponents.

In such cases, the data process part 14, such as microprocessor andrelated peripheral devices and circuits, is responsible for processingthe raw data and executing various types of compression for the rawdata. For example, color compression may be used, in which case ananalysis of chrominance and luminance components might be performed inorder to provide recommendations among various color and non-colorcompression schemes. Next, the data process part 14 outputs theprocessed image data to a host computer 16 for further data processing.

In one embodiment of the present invention, the data process part 14 canprovides users to select various compression models, such as “Loss-less”and “Lossy”, for a single document 10 through the host computer 16. Forexample, users can select “Loss-less” compression model for the sourceimage of the document 10 on consideration of non-distortion. The“Loss-less” compression model processes the image data with the lowerratio of compression, which doesn't result in distortion throughdecompression by the host computer 16. On the other hand, users select“Lossy” compression model for the other inferior parts of the document10 on consideration of the less capacity of data. The “Lossy”compression model processes the image data with the higher ratio ofcompression, which may reduce the capacity of the image data and speedup the scanning process.

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram illustrating the flow chart in accordancewith the present invention. First, pre-scanning of a document isperformed by the scanner with default settings (step 20) in order toperform classification of the document. Users can view the pre-scannedimage on a display screen with any image software in the host computer.Next, users would select a scanned zone for the document they wantthrough the tools provided by the image software (step 22). As one ofkey features of the present invention, users can further determine oneor more “Loss-less” zones and “Lossy” zones on the selected scanned zone(step 24). In the present invention, the geometric shapes of the“Loss-less” or “Lossy” zones can be arbitrary, dependent on the usersand the tools provided by the image software. Then the formal scanningof the document is implemented by the scanner according to the users'settings through the host computer (step 26).

While this invention has been described with reference to illustrativeembodiments, this description is not intended to be construed in alimiting sense. Various modifications and combinations of theillustrative embodiments, as well as other embodiments of the invention,will be apparent to persons skilled in the art upon reference to thedescription. It is therefore intended that the appended claims encompassany such modifications or embodiments.

1.-12. (canceled)
 13. A scanner, comprising: an image-capturingcomponent adapted to obtain a preliminary scanned image of a document;and an image-processing component adapted to: display the preliminaryscanned image of said document; receive a selection of a scanning zoneof the preliminary scanned image, wherein the scanning zone comprisesless than the entire preliminary scanned image; and receive a selectionof at least one sub-zone of the scanning zone, wherein selection of theat least one sub-zone comprises designation of an arbitrary area of thescanning zone, and wherein selection of a sub-zone further comprisesdesignation of a compression model for the sub-zone, wherein thecompression model defines at least one compression ratio.
 14. Thescanner of claim 13, wherein the image-capturing component is furtheradapted to scan said document in accordance with the received selectionof a scanning zone and at least one sub-zone.
 15. The scanner of claim13, wherein said compression model defines differing compressionconfigurations for at least two portions of the image.
 16. The scannerof claim 15, wherein the differing compression configurations compriseat least lossy and lossless compression.
 17. An apparatus, comprising:means for pre-scanning an object to obtain a preliminary scanned imageincluding a scanning zone; means for obtaining a chrominance andluminance analysis of at least a portion of the scanning zone; and meansfor displaying a plurality of user-selectable sub-zones associated witha plurality of user-selectable compression ratios, wherein the sub-zonesand compression ratios are determined based at least in part on theobtained chrominance and luminance analysis.
 18. The apparatus of claim17, further comprising means for displaying said plurality ofuser-selectable sub-zones.
 19. The apparatus of claim 17, wherein saidplurality of compression ratios comprise at least lossy and losslesscompression ratios.
 20. An article comprising a storage medium havingstored thereon instructions that, when executed, result in: obtaining apreliminary scanned image of a document; selecting a scanning zone ofthe document based on the preliminary scanned image, wherein thescanning zone comprises less than the entire document; selecting atleast one sub-zone of the scanning zone, wherein selecting at least onesub-zone comprises designation of an arbitrary area of the scanningzone, and wherein selecting a sub-zone further comprises designation ofat least one compression ratio for the sub-zone; and scanning thedocument in accordance with the selected scanning zone and selected atleast one sub-zone.
 21. The article of claim 20, wherein theinstructions, when executed, further result in: displaying saidpreliminary scanned image.
 22. The article of claim 20, wherein theinstructions, when executed, further result in: providing datacorresponding to said scanned document to an external device.
 23. Thearticle of claim 20, wherein the instructions, when executed, furtherresult in: displaying one or more user-selectable scan zones.
 24. Thearticle of claim 20, wherein the instructions, when executed, furtherresult in: designating a combination of lossy and lossless compressionratios for the at least one sub-zone.
 25. An article comprising astorage medium having stored thereon instructions that, when executed,result in: pre-scanning an object to obtain a preliminary scanned imageincluding a scanning zone; obtaining a chrominance and luminanceanalysis of at least a portion of the scanning zone; and displaying aplurality of user-selectable sub-zones associated with a plurality ofuser-selectable compression ratios, wherein the sub-zones andcompression ratios are determined based at least in part on saidchrominance and luminance analysis.
 26. The article of claim 25, whereinthe instructions, when executed, further result in: determining acombination of lossy and lossless compression ratios as the plurality ofuser-selectable compression ratios.